Ruaridh Mollica

Source: Rob McDougall

Ruaridh Mollica

For Scottish-Italian actor Ruaridh Mollica, the 12 months between landing the lead role in Finnish filmmaker Mikko Makela’s Sebastian and the cameras rolling were somewhat nerve-racking. Living in London, Mollica was under the cosh financially, juggling a changing start date with part-time paid work.

“I kept thinking the film would be happening next month, and that’ll be fine, but then it kept getting pushed. I ended up working a variety of retail jobs,” says Mollica, who met with Makela every couple of weeks. “We would go through the whole script, scene by scene, page by page, talk about my character. A lot of the heavy lifting that you sometimes have to do by yourself as an actor became a very collaborative process.”

Sebastian, which debuted at Sundance this year, details the story of a journalist who goes undercover as a sex worker to research his debut novel. Between globe-trotting trips to promote the film, Mollica also starred in father-and-son drama Sukkwan Island for French director Vladimir de Fontenay. He also landed his first comedy role in the Sam Mendes-directed HBO series The Franchise, co-written by Armando Iannucci, and starring Richard E Grant, Daniel Brühl and Jessica Hynes. “I’d never been seen as a comedy actor before. It’s so different, harder than drama, because timing is so important.”

Born to a Scottish mother and an Italian father, Mollica has a degree in computer science from Edinburgh’s Heriot Watt University and loves all things tech, primarily cyber security and cryptocurrency. As one of the first family members to go to university, he says there was a crossroads moment when he weighed up pursuing a career in cyber security or being an actor.

Mollica is also working on a script about his photographer father, who was 32 when he was hit by a motorbike and lost his sight. “He had to come to terms with probably the worst hand you can be dealt for a photographer, but he’s the most joyful person I know and I want to write something about that,” says Mollica. “I’m open and flexible to anything, as long as it’s well-written. A silent film would be an interesting challenge.”

Contact: Ruth Hollyman, Strange Town Agency; Greg Herst, Conway Van Gelder Grant 

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